Kukla's Korner Hockey

Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff called a timeout with just 13.6 seconds to play and his team leading 7-4. Ruff defended the move by saying he didn’t like having Lane MacDermid, a noted fighter, lined up against one of his own skill guys.

So, he called timeout and changed things up, which involved sending John Scott over the bench to keep the peace, so to speak.

“MacDermid was with one of our skill players,” Ruff said after the game. “I didn’t want anything to happen.

That’s really what it all was about.” That didn’t go over with at least one Bruins player.

“Yeah, [Ruff] wants to be a big shot, and that’s not the best play to do,” Brad Marchand said. “That’s pretty disrespectful. If he wants to be like that, that’s fine. We just have to move on.”

seriously, talk about classless. Made me immediately think of that Islanders game.. but Detroit didnt’ have any noted tough-guys and that wasn’t our modus operandi. Seems in this case, it was smart. The Bruins aren’t known to be the more gentlemanly club.

What Marchand is REALLY pissed about is Bruins tough guys didn’t get a chance to hurt a skill player as retribution for beating them. Take that to the bank.

I was watching this one. The Bs had just called a time out on the previous whistle, even though the game was already out of hand. Ruff called it for the lineup swap, which was evident. He didn’t bring all the players to the bench to strategize, he just made a line swap. Boston booed him (expected) and the last 13 seconds clicked away. But that last minute lasted so long, it felt almost as bad as an NBA game.

Given the history between these two teams, and what happened earlier to Thornton, absolutely a smart move by Ruff. He’s not a goon-it-up type coach, nor do I recall too many instances of him trying to make other teams look bad (and back when Buffalo had a great team for a few years there, I’m sure he had ample opportunities).

And as said above, Marchand chirping about classless this or disrespect that is the richest thing in the world. Lil twerp plays one of the dirtiest games in the league, but gets away with it because a) he’s undersized and b) he can actually play the game at a high level.

It’s a shame Boston is such an easy team to hate, because there are a handful of players on there (Chris Kelly, Chara, Seguin, Boychuk) I really like and respect.